After deciding the money pouch was too heavy, Sokka declared that they should stay the night at an inn. Ravenous, thirteen-year-old Aang suggested they eat there, too. Generally sick of eating stale food and sleeping on rocks, Katara reluctantly agreed. Spendthrift habits die hard, even when they knew they were homeward bound.
She saw them first, the group of men garbed in the thick blue cloth of her nation. Holding her breath, barely daring to hope, she approached the group and tapped the one laughing the loudest. The noisy man turned -- Katara screamed with delight -- Sokka and Aang rushed to her side -- the man crushed the water siblings in a bear hug -- Aang understood.
He hung back while Katara's father commented on how long his daughter's hair had gotten and how much Sokka had grown. Katara blushed and giggled; Sokka showed off nonexistent arm muscles. With a strange ache in his the pit of his stomach, Aang suddenly thought of Monk Gyatso without meaning to.
Then, the man the size of a house untangled himself from his children and waved Aang closer.
"This," He declared loudly to the inn at large, "is my newest son, Aang."